The Feast of Souls
by Rhysand-vs-Fenrys
Summary: Everyone gathers at the estate in Velaris for the Feast of Souls- and to quietly investigate Feyre's erratic behavior and strange temperament. Figuring out what is wrong with her is the easy part though- the hard part will be saving her soul before the clock strikes midnight and she is lost forever.
1. Chapter 1

**Prologue**

She had no idea what woke her.

Feyre was warm, her blankets were soft, and her mattress as comfortable as ever. Her body felt light and relaxed- yet the exhaustion clinging to her mind said that she wasn't ready to get up yet. Her bladder wasn't full, her mouth didn't seem dry- so why was she awake?

The memory of a sound came to her foggy mind. One she'd heard and not heard at the same time. An echo that had startled her awake, yet soon enough was forgotten.

A low, strained breath sounded by her ear- the final gasp of one succumbing to a slow death. It was so near, as if the one who made that sound was right beside her- but Rhys slept on her right, and the sound came from her left.

Feyre's eyes snapped open, but her body stayed locked in place. Rhys' arm was across her chest, holding her as he slept. Another death-gasp sounded in her ear, so close that she could have sworn she felt breath.

 _It's all in your head_ , she told herself. _There's nothing else here._

But then her eyes realized what they were seeing.

In the corner of their bedroom, illuminated by its own power, was the figure of a female dressed all in black.

Her features were impossible to focus on. They warped and shifted constantly, but somehow her eyes were immune. They were opaque, covered in a thick film, and sunk deep into her skull.

The eyes of one long dead.

Feyre didn't dare move. If she moved, the creature watching her might as well. Death-gasps filled her ears and she longed to wake the male next to her, to not face this terror alone. More and more of the ghosts' face came into focus as it gathered its strength. She had to break the stalemate before it gained too much strength.

She tensed, ready to move.

That ghostly breath against her ear hitched-

-and the Gray Lady's face broke into a wide, rotted grin.

* * *

 **Chapter 1**

For the first time in a decade, the Feast of Souls was delayed because of weather.

A steady, soaking rain clung to the mountains around Velaris, bringing not only unseasonably cold temperatures, but what felt like an endless supply of water. Rhys' careful attention kept the Sidra from overflowing its banks, but after hours of discussion with school and community leaders, he agreed to postpone the usual treat-giving until the clouds broke.

Feyre didn't bother hiding her glee.

Mor was visiting from the Continent, Cassian from the Illyrian Steppes, and even Lucien accepted an invitation to gather in Velaris for a traditional harvest feast. Sure they would all be together again for Solstice in just a couple months' time, but Feyre had an important announcement to make.

"Feyre's not pregnant," Mor yelled from the staircase as Rhys opened the front door to admit a dripping-wet Cassian.

He raised an eyebrow to Rhys, "Is that a trendy new greeting on the Continent or something?"

Mor shrugged and came down to give her old friend a welcoming hug, "No, it's just when Feyre said we all had to be here, I figured it meant a baby." She swatted moisture from her skin.

"Same," Lucien called from the sitting room. He'd arrived before even breakfast, ladened with herbs and spices from Dawn's world-famous markets. When he offered to pick them up on his way north, he had underestimated just how long of a list Elain would give Feyre. It felt (and looked) like he'd carried half the spice market with him.

Cassian snored, "Screw Feyre, I'm more interested in you saying you'll come back for good."

Rhys lightly swatted Cassian's head and wandered away. Mor was the one who decided when she was ready to return to Night. She needed a vacation from her Court.

"I'll come back when I come back." Only Feyre knew that Mor had met someone on the Continent- a beautiful fae woman who might very well prove to be her mate. Mor's place was in Night, and it was to Night she would return one day, but Feyre advised her long ago to stay until she was ready to love her female openly. No more hiding, and no more horrible secrets to eat away at her heart.

Cassian might not know anything about the source of Mor's happiness, but he could see that she was brighter and more at ease than she'd been in centuries. Mor took lovers just like any other member of the Inner Circle, but there was a distinct glow that came from long-term romance and she was radiant with it.

"Where's Feyre? I should have a fireball in the face by now for the 'screw her' comment," Cassian rested his elbow on Mor's shoulder and leaned on her until she winnowed away. He fell in a wet _thwack_ of furs and laughed.

Rhys couldn't force himself to take the same jovial tone, "She's taking a nap, she hasn't been sleeping well."

"Is she alright?" Cassian brushed off his leathers as he stood. It was late afternoon outside- if Feyre was still asleep either she intended to be up all night or she was beyond exhausted.

Rhys sighed, "I don't know."

"I'm tired," a voice called from upstairs, "not dying."

With a burst of black mist and a clap of thunder, Rhys winnowed to his wife's side. She was wearing a dark blue gown with silver embroidery- which only highlighted how pale she was. Her hair was neatly pinned and twisted through a diadem heavy with star sapphires, and not a single strand escaped her control. A matching necklace and earring set completed her ridiculously formal attire.

When Cassian met her on the stairs he moved to hug her- and Feyre stepped back, "Wet." She eyed his drenched clothing.

Elain must have been hovering because she appeared in an instant with a steaming mug of spiced tea for her little sister, "Caffeinated tea, as requested."

"Thank you Elain." Feyre eyed the oversized and lumpy mug with some distaste, but accepted it anyways.

The mug was made for her by one of the children from her studio. He'd been blinded during the attack on Velaris and so she'd worked with a potter from the Rainbow so that he could sit beside his twin sister and still create. The look she gave it now- it was like she was forcing herself to even touch it.

"Bad dreams messing with your sleep schedule?" Cassian kissed Elain's forehead as a greeting and slipped her a folded square of paper- he was a notorious smuggler of letters from Nesta. This one was incredibly short, but Elain dashed back into the kitchen to read all the same.

Feyre had no contact with her older sister, beyond vague reports Cassian sent each of the six months she'd been training. The last thing Nesta needed was to feel like she was being studied day and night. Cassian let her read his reports and remove anything she wasn't comfortable with her family knowing (really anything about her mental health) and had taken to adding little notes for Elain and Amren. She was mending bridges as best she could- but her relationship with Feyre was never on solid ground. Nesta didn't want to send her notes. She wanted to speak to her face-to-face.

"A busy mind doesn't rest easily," Feyre pretended she didn't see the note.

"If there's anything I can do, let me know." Cassian offered Feyre a hopeful smile, "I'll send Nesta on another hunter-tracker mission and you can spend some time in the Steppes, get out of the city and clear your head."

"That won't be necessary. Don't torture Nesta on my account," Feyre said.

Illyrian hunter-tracker missions could last for weeks, according to one of Cassian's reports. Nesta was training in fighting and weapons with a unit of younglings- the only Illyrians at her ability level. When her troop was off on flying training, Cassian taught her some of the more instinctual Illyrian arts. She was obsessed with mastering hunting and tracking, if only to have something in common with her youngest sister.

"I leave the torture wholly at her discretion," Cassian laughed. "More often than not I'm the one holding her back after she decides she's ready."

A knock sounded at the door and interrupted any further discussion. Feyre's eyes narrowed at the door. Everyone who should be there already was.

Amren would spend the holiday in Summer with Varian, and Feyre had sent Azriel to the Court of Nightmares with Nuala and Cerridwen to do final inspections of prisoners set to be executed during the Feast of Souls. Rhys had already intervened on behalf of those whose guilt Azriel deemed suspect, but Feyre was adamant he go all the same. None of them would return until well after midnight.

Cassian glanced back to feyre, verifying once again that she was unarmed, before nodding to Rhys.

The door opened, and the room froze.

Feyre stared at the female who stepped in from the rain. Confusion gave way to hostility in seconds.

Nesta was soaked to the bone, covered in mud, and carried a heavy-looking leather pack on her back. Her hair was done up in five long braids woven with leather and metal bands. There was nothing delicate about her appearance, nothing imperious or aloof either. She wasn't the Nesta who first came to Velaris, or the half-drunk one who'd been banished in Feyre's intervention.

She was exhausted, dirty, and frozen to the bone, but she was still happy and at peace.

Nesta met Feyre's gaze and for the first time in memory looked _at_ her sister, not through her, "Is it alright if I-"

"Yes." Emotion welled in Feyre's eyes, but it was shoved down quickly. Rhys closed the door behind Nesta and watched the Archerons face one another.

"Are you- you look well?"

"I am," Feyre looked Nesta over. She allowed a flicker of disapproval to crack the mask on her face, "And you- you look… wet."

" _Feyre_ ," Mor stepped over to elbow her friend. Even Rhys frowned.

A squeal sounded from the kitchen- Elain reading Nesta's note (which simply said 'I'm on the porch'). A second later a blur of pink shot through the doors and aimed straight for Nesta.

Feyre reached out and snatched the back of Elain's dress as she passed, ripping off a chunk of fabric and taking her sister's legs out from under her in the process. Lucien was up in an instant to catch Elain as she fell.

"Feyre!" It was the most common exclamation as everyone shouted at once.

Rhys, Cassian, Lucien, Mor, and even Nesta were incredulous. Elain was more stunned than anything. Her cheeks burned red and Mor quickly came to hold the torn back of her dress closed as she and Lucien helped the female to stand.

"My apologies," Feyre's voice was cold as she dropped the scrap of cloth. "I didn't want Elain to ruin her dress. Sometimes I forget how strong fae are."

Lucien released Elain so that Nesta could take his place. He didn't plant himself between the heavily armed warrior and her sister, but he did pull the tie from his hair and bind the scraps of dress Mor was holding, giving Elain at least something resembling modesty.

His end of the mating bond roared, but the snarl Lucien aimed at Feyre had nothing to do with those primal fae instincts. It was the reaction of any decent fae who saw another harmed. Hell, it was the same snarl that lit Cassian's face.

"What the hell is wrong with you?!" Nesta snapped.

"I don't need to listen to language like that from a half-wild beast." Feyre dismissed Nesta and Cassian both with snort, "Elain can show you both where to clean up. Elain- I'll replace the dress. Just remember how dangerous it is to fling yourself at others."

Nothing in her face or tone showed remorse.

Elain tore herself from Nesta and Mor's grip and ran up the stairs, her face buried in her hands. Cassian growled at Feyre before he and Nesta followed without a single damn care for the muddy prints they left across the floor.

"I understand that Nesta puts you on edge, but WHAT THE FUCK WAS THAT?!" Rhys rounded on his mate.

"WHY DIDN'T YOU TELL ME SHE WAS COMING?!" Feyre screamed before slumping back onto the couch and bursting into tears, "I know you needed someone to be the _bad guy_ and I'm the easiest target, but do you know how _hard_ it is to have everyone blame me for _her_ decisions?! You all bully me like it's my fault she isn't in this city, then you just throw her at my feet and expect me to be grateful?!"

Rhys opened his mouth, but Feyre cut him off, "Don't you dare say you didn't know they were coming. DON'T YOU DARE, RHYS! YOU'RE MY HUSBAND, YOU'RE SUPPOSED TO SUPPORT ME, NOT UNDERMINE ME!"

"I'm not going to watch this little pity-party," Lucien spat as he stormed off into the kitchen. He couldn't go see if Elain was alright, but he could at least make sure the food she'd worked so hard on didn't burn.

Rhys threw his arms up and winnowed away, leaving Mor to glare at Feyre with as much wrath as she possessed.

"I need a friend here, Morrigan," Feyre sniffled.

"Then don't treat your family like shit." Mor followed Lucien, if only to put some space between her and her best friend.

Feyre just rolled her now-dry eyes and crossed one leg over the other. Her slippered toes hit the mug, sending it across the room where it shattered against the stone walls.

"Oops."

—

* * *

—

Rhys winnowed directly into the guest room where Elain had led Nesta and Cassian, "Elain, are you alright?" The words were out before he was fully formed.

"I'm fine," Elain looked scared more than anything.

Nesta and Cassian hid their fear better than most, but they were standing together in the marble bathroom and arguing in hushed tones. Rhys kicked the bathroom door closed and put a hand over his eyes, "Ready?"

"Yeah."

With a wave of his free hand, Elain's dress vanished. Before she could feel any embarrassment, he snapped his fingers. The lilac dress that replaced her ruined one was part of a set Feyre had ordered for that night's intended announcement. Lucien's hair-tie fell to the ground, and Elain picked it up as Rhys uncovered his eyes.

"Well?" He opened the bathroom door.

Nesta came to hold Elain's hand. She sighed and nodded, "I think Elain and Azriel are right… That's not Feyre."

"So where the fuck is my mate?"

He had no way of knowing that Feyre was already halfway through the vale.

—

* * *

—

It came on gradually.

Feyre reaching for her Illyrian leathers only to decide she didn't feel like wearing them anymore. A gentle prod to sit straighter at dinner. A new appreciation for her crowns.

The blackouts were only a few seconds long, and didn't seem to cause any harm, so she didn't bring them up. Though- maybe that was the will of The Other.

As the days crawled by, things began to change. Feyre lost more and more time, until it wasn't seconds missing, but rather seconds remembered. Short bursts of life in an otherwise clouded world.

Initially the presence only came when she was about to do something it didn't want, now _she_ was the one fading in and out of existence.

It was sedating her, pushing her mind down gradually, until Feyre didn't even have enough strength to fight it. It infected her mating bond, captured the messages Rhys sent to her and used her to reply as it desired.

Once, it tried to bed Rhys in Feyre's place. The shock and rage brought her roaring back to life for a few moments- but then the creature learned its lesson. It never accepted more than a chaste kiss on the cheek from her husband.

Her last clear thought was to send Azriel away, just in case he saw… well, whatever the shadows might tell him. The Other was uncomfortable with him, and hated his pet wraiths. If she didn't send them away, Feyre had an awful feeling that they would die.

There was a stirring of Feyre's mind when The Other met Nesta's eyes for the first time- but it wasn't enough to bring her back. The sound of Elain's dress ripping registered, as did the crash of her favorite mug against the wall, but she'd already lost her fight. Now she was The Other, and the creature would be Feyre in her place.

She clung to the mating bond with every ounce of strength she possessed, but Feyre was losing to the tug at her back. It would be so easy to just let go and fade into the abyss that called her. An abyss made of fire, rage, and darkness.

The Other had crawled its way out of Hell itself to return to the land of the living. For one week it wove a web around Feyre's body to anchor itself on that side of the veil.

By midnight, Death would either reclaim The Other, or take Feyre Archeron in its place.

And there was nothing the others could do to stop it.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2**

On the second day, Azriel asked Nuala to monitor Feyre's health.

She seemed quieter than usual, less engaged. Her focus drifted, her temperament would shift unpredictably.

Rhys noticed it too.

It's probably just bad dreams or stress, Azriel and Rhys agreed on that point. But by the third day she was worse, and Nuala brought her employers news not of an illness, but of a darkness that seemed to stain her. A darkness the half-wraiths could see, that his shadows might sense.

Whatever the source of the stain, it hid from the Wraiths. It would retreat wholly before they entered the room, and return the moment they left. So when the so-called Feyre told Azriel to re-check every prisoner slated for execution, he knew it was an excuse to get rid of the three.

Azriel was at the estate for breakfast, chatting idly with Elain, when she first whispered her fear- that something was creeping into Feyre's mind and taking over.

Rhys checked on their mating bond constantly, reaching for Feyre on the other side. She seemed to reply, and thanks to the bargain he made with his wife he knew she had to be alive. Still… Something was wrong.

Nesta's arrival for the Feast of Souls was meant to be a surprise for Feyre. Guilt and doubt over sending her to the Steppes was eating at the High Lady's heart. She was resistant to the idea of banishing Nesta- it took months for Cassian to convince her an intervention was for the best. Even as reports from the Steppes came in illustrating Nesta's improvement.

Cassian decided to make Nesta's return to Velaris a training exercise- the pair hiked all the way from the Illyrian Steppes. The fact that it started raining halfway through and never let up didn't phase Nesta too much, but Cassian began bitching incessantly. Mercifully Rhysand interrupted their trek two days out.

Elain and Azriel think she's been replaced or possessed by something, he'd explained. I- I know something is wrong, but the mating bond is secure. Just- provoke her or something when you arrive. I'm hoping we're all just insane and she's fine. Every day it feels like I lose her a little bit more…

Rhysand knew Elain and Azriel were correct, but he needed to see Cassian and Nesta. He needed someone he could speak openly with, without fear of Feyre appearing over his shoulder in the estate. He'd offered to fly Nesta into Velaris, spare them both the mud and wilds on that final push towards the mountains.

Cassian refused, if only because of Nesta. She was preparing herself for that return to Velaris, a city she'd left as a withered husk of a female. At the time it didn't sound like Feyre was possessed so much as distracted, and he wasn't going to push Nesta forward too quickly. They'd discussed this return for months, but the closer that city got, the harder it was for her to put one foot in front of the other.

On that same day Azriel entered the most ancient halls of the library and came back with every book he could find on changelings, shapeshifters, mating bonds, and Daemati. He needed to figure out why Rhys couldn't sense any problems on the other end of the bond, and what manner of creature could hijack Feyres soul-deep connection.

Nuala and Cerridwen went to their mother's realm, charged with learning all they could about ghostly possession. Their trip should have lasted a few hours at most, but they never returned.

Now, as the seventh day drew closer and closer to an end, Rhys winnowed into the House of Wind to see what Azriel might have found. Feyre was worse than ever, most vestiges of his mate were gone, and even their bond was growing cold.

"As you know, a mating bond is a soul bond, it runs deeper than any connection to a physical body. That means Feyre has to still be in there," Azriel explained. He was sitting on his bed, surrounded on all sides by books. Usually he took Rhys to a study or meeting room for such discussions, but his bedroom walls were covered in wards placed there in ancient times by a High Lord afraid of the newly-escaped Rhysand couldn't enter the Spymaster's chambers without verbal permission.

Rhys reached out for Feyre, and felt an apologetic stroke to the adamant walls of his mind. He shivered, "When I tried to kiss her, Feyre came back. When Nesta first arrived- I think part of her woke up."

Azriel sighed, "So it's hold isn't complete, but it took enough control to infect the bond. We need to draw Feyre out- how do you feel about inviting Tamlin to dinner?"

"I'd drink acid if it meant she was alright," Rhys growled. "It wouldn't work though… Elain wasn't hurt but-"

"What did it do to Elain?" Fire burned in Azriel's eyes.

"She wanted to run to Nesta and whatever is controlling Feyre grabbed her dress. It tore most of the back away. Lucien caught her, and he helped tie the scraps together so the whole front of the dress wouldn't fall open." Rhys could see Azriel was a heartbeat from winnowing into the estate so he held up a hand, "Elain is alright, and she knows it wasn't really her sister's fault. I think she's more afraid for Feyre than anything."

"As she should be," a graveyard whisper Rhys was somewhat familiar with sounded from beneath the door. The voice came from the other side- high and innocent, "You should be afraid as well, High Lord."

With the door closed, they were safe. If he tried to peek at the creature on the other side, it would have no choice but to drag him through to the realm of the dead. Even knowing that though, the temptation was overwhelming. Bogge and Wraith held the same lure in their very essence.

"Where are Nuala and Cerridwen?" Azriel was calm. He had fewer dealings with the twins' mother than Rhys, but he was smart enough to keep his voice even. There was no demand in his question, just curiosity.

"My daughters stand with one foot in your world," the wraith breathed. "I would prefer to keep it that way, so they must stay with me for as long as the Slaugh roams free."

"Slaugh?" Azriel ticked through his mental list of monsters, "The unforgiven dead?"

"Unforgiven is misleading, Shadowspeaker. Unforgotten is more accurate."

"What do you mean?" Rhysand asked.

The wraith sounded almost frightened, "Only during the Feast of Souls can the veil be pushed aside. Possession that reaches the soul- let alone malevolent possession- it takes a long time for the summons to be made, and the path must be cleared from both ends. The Slaugh planted itself in her mind while it was a living creature, and in death your High Lady called to it until it returned."

"Feyre wouldn't do that," Azriel said.

Rhys felt like his entire being was frozen.

"Hatred, fear- both are beacons to a Slaugh. They are creatures Hell has stripped of any sliver of kindness or love, so the worst of emotions draws them out. She called to someone- unintentional as it might have been. It was a pressing demand too if it came an entire week before the Feast. That takes the most profound of connections."

"How do we save her?" Rhysand hissed.

"Trap the body with a ring of salt and ash, and bind the creature to fire by name. If Feyre Archeron has survived this long, your actions will give her what she needs to fight it from within. The summons came from Slaugh and Fae, it's destruction must as well… but you fools were too slow in spotting the signs. When the Feast of Souls passes, so too will the High Lady of Night. The creature will be more powerful than you can imagine- and more cruel than it was in life."

"If Feyre Archeron survived?" Azriel's heart pounded in his chest. He had to ask- because he knew Rhys wasn't breathing anymore.

"A soul escaped from Hell. There are no empty seats at the Table of the Damned. If Feyre doesn't expel the Slaugh, she will be dragged back in its place- and no matter how strong the summons, nothing will resurrect her… and from what Nuala and Cerridwen have told me, she is far too kind to survive the dark realm with her mind whole."

There was a hiss of pain from the wraith- it took too much strength to remain on that side of the veil for long. She'd seduced a mortal fae into her own realm to conceive her precious twin daughters, but since her mortal death she had never remained more than a few moments.

"Ash and salt, and you must bind the name with fire," she said quickly. "I'm sorry I cannot help you more. I will send Nuala and Cerridwen back to you once I know the Slaugh is gone. They want you to know that they are fighting my will and will do what they can to aid you from our side."

"Thank you," Azriel called as the room fell silent. Nuala and Cerridwen didn't want him to think they'd abandoned Feyre to her fate, but honestly there wasn't much they could do anyways. Not with Cassian, Nesta, Mor, and Elain. If Amren hadn't retreated with Varian she might be able to help as well, but no one knew where the monster and the fae Lord went on their little trips.

"A malevolent spirit Feyre thinks about often enough to accidentally summon. One with a strong personal connection to her," Azriel said.

"You know who it is," Rhys whispered. He was shaking with rage and radiating Night itself. Seven days. Seven days spent beside that creature- something he was disgusted to admit was as familiar to him as his own wife. The monster who haunted both of their nightmares. A demon who was obsessed with crowns and the imagined status they gave, just as Feyre had been for the last few days.

Rhys looked like he would snap at any moment and unleash his power to mist all of Prythian.

"Find the ingredients and meet me at the estate," a snarl curled Rhys' lip. "Amarantha is going back to the Hell she crawled from."

* * *

When she saw Nesta, the creature who had taken everything from her recoiled. Perhaps it was her power- the creature instinctively flinching away from the Death just beneath her skin. Rhys might say it was because Nesta in that moment looked almost the same as Feyre had at the end of her first act of defiance- the trial with the Middengard wyrm she was never supposed to win. Caked in mud with those blue-gray Archeron eyes and that long, sun-kissed hair-

Or maybe it was Feyre who surged forward, overwhelmed with relief at the sight of her sister so much stronger than she'd been when she was sent away.

The Other didn't let her surface for long. It shoved her down with a passionate, brutal force that not only buried her, but broke her tender hold on her own body.

Feyre fell into the void that tugged at her. She could feel it's triumph, and the smug satisfaction of the monster in her skin.

Will it hurt? She thought, Will I go somewhere safe? Will I go somewhere horrible?

A thought struck her, and soon Feyre was thrashing, screaming for the life she was about to take with her own death: If I die, Rhys dies too.

For the one who would be left behind, their bargain was a blessing.

For the one who would drag the other through the vale, a curse.

She was about to murder her own mate, leaving behind a monster with the power of a High Lady, and complete control over the most powerful Court in Prythian.

But it was too late.

Feyre fell into the abyss, towards that point from which there could never be any return. Though everything was darkness, she felt the line rapidly approaching. She screamed for Rhys, both begging for aid and trying to use her memory of him to bring herself back home.

A hair's breadth from the veil, something slammed into Feyre.

It felt solid, and as she crashed into the darkness of the void, it never relented. The force drove her to the side of that black tunnel, then through it to hard ground.

A body formed around everything that was Feyre Archeron, and she spun wildly in a tangle of limbs that bruised and scraped on hardwood floors.

Feyre felt instantly stronger. She jumped to her feet and braced for a fight. If The Other wanted a battle, she would give it one.

"Fuck," across the room, curled around the leg of a massive piano, a girl pulled herself to her feet. She was gray as death, her hair long and black, and she wore only a simple white gown.

The kind of burial shroud that might be put on a corpse.

"Who are you?" Feyre's voice sounded flat, even to her. It distorted and wavered, repeated itself in echoes that weren't echoes.

The sound reminded her of a half-forgotten nightmare, and breaths against her ear.

"A friend," the girl shook her head and stumbled a few steps. Feyre growled and nearly attacked. "Calm down. If I wanted to hurt you I'd have let you go through the veil."

"Who. Are. You."

"A vengeful ghost. Rawr." The girl swiped in Feyre's direction with imaginary claws and turned to look around the room, "Well this is… hideous."

Feyre was just starting to wonder if she could make the girl feel pain when her companion rolled her eyes, "Think of me as an evil spirit who preys on evil spirits. The ghost that's forcing you out opened a door and left it open. Any normal spirit would try to pull it back. Like- like how a guardian angel might swoop in to save your life. Except your angel gave up its oomph and is shacked up on the coast of Summer."

"Why do you care what happens to me?"

"Boredom."

"That's not a reason."

"No, it's not a good reason," the girl went back to studying the room, "but it's fantastic motivation. The other side- the good end of it- is an 'evergreen land of milk and honey'," she mocked the funeral prayer. "What does that sound like to you? Boring. Especially when you die single. All the good males on my side of death seem to be either taken or only interested in other males and Cauldron my parents are overbearing. Like, I'm dead, what other trouble could I get into? I can't re-life myself."

"Well- what do I call you?" Feyre gave up. It felt like the girl was being honest, and the sentiment was one Feyre understood well enough- she was dead if she crossed that abyss, so to protect Rhys' own life, it was in her best interest to stay on this side of the line.

"Teallaire, call me Tealla," the girl came over and stuck out her hand for Feyre to shake.

When their skin touched, Feyre jumped back with a hiss. Tealla's hand was icy, and her touch burned. The girl cursed and tried to shake away her own pain, "I forgot for a second there- you're still alive. Fuck. I think you burned me."

Feyre didn't reply. She was staring at her hand- where the skin was a pale gray.

"You didn't notice that?" Tealla massaged some feeling back out of her hand, "Look around, genius. Figured a painter would notice it first."

They were in the parlor of a large house, if that room was any indication. A curio of expensive-looking blown glass stood proudly against one wall, the piano Tealla had crashed into across from it. Couches and settees dotted the room, ready to entertain a small crowd of well-born Lords and Ladies. The walls were positively coated in portraits and a hodgepodge of expensive (if overly ornate) frames.

Everything was in shades of black and white.

The floor, the embossed wallpaper, the chandeliers twinkling with sunlight from windows so bright they were impossible to see through- not a single speck of color breathed life into the room.

"What is this place?"

Tealla cast an eye to a painting of a regal-looking old man against one wall, "The heart of the Slaugh."

Feyre growled, "I swear, if you make me ask every question twice-"

"This time I'm actually answering, ok?" Tealla waved her off, "Every soul who passes through to the other side has something they anchor themselves around. Memories, feelings- echoes of the person they used to be. This Slaugh is one strong bitch. I didn't know how to help you, so I brought you here. The eye of the storm. The only place it won't think to look for you."

"Can I kill it from in here?"

Tealla laughed, "Why do you think I came to help?"

"Who are you?" Feyre tried again, "Are you someone from my past?" Perhaps a village girl she couldn't remember.

"Nope."

"My future?" The spectre of another child, like what the Bone Carver appeared as?

"Nah."

Feyre was at a loss, "My mate's future?"

"No."

"An old lover of Rhys'? I won't be mad-"

"Not in my worst nightmare." Tealla shivered.

There was only one other female teenager in anyone's lives Feyre knew of, "Rhys'... Rhys' sister?"

"Yes."

"Really?!" her heart raced.

"Sure."

Feyre sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose, willing the growing headache back, "Are you just saying that so I'll stop trying to guess?"

"Of course." Tealla was looking at the two large doors that led out of the room, "I feel like going through…. That one." She pointed to one on the south end.

"What are we even doing?" Feyre had no desire to stumble blindly through the memories of a monster, especially not with an unknown ghost she didn't have any reason to trust.

Tealla looked at her like she was an idiot, and when she spoke her words were slow and careful, "We're in the memories of the ghost that's possessing you. Maybe it's a good idea find our way out?"

Feyre growled at the girl. She tried to summon wings or use her magic to craft a weapon- something to show the brat that she knew how to handle herself.

Tealla just laughed, "Magic is tied to the body, genius."

"I'm starting to see why you died young," Feyre grumbled.

As a human, she'd fought Amarantha and won (albeit with help and a ridiculous bargain the wannabe-Queen should never have agreed to). She didn't have her magic or anything resembling a weapon, but the three most powerful Illyrians in history were her teachers. Feyre could fight. If she could find her opening, she could battle the creature that was possessing her, infect it's memories and it's mind and force it out the same way it had forced her.

"You stay in front of me at all times," Feyre walked to the door and crossed her arms, refusing to go through first. Nothing could make her turn her back on the girl.

"I'm glad to know the Night Court is in such wonderfully capable hands," Tealla sketched a mock bow before slipping into the hallway.

* * *

Time passed differently in the memories.

Feyre and Tealla moved quietly, cautiously down the hallway. Hours passed- no, seconds. Wait- it was years… or perhaps minutes?

The house was old, but well maintained. It was undoubtedly built by slaves, yet Feyre didn't see any echoes of them as they searched.

What she did see was so much worse than she could have anticipated.

A transparent little girl ran past her, giggling as a second smaller figure chased her. There was somewhat of an age gap between the two, but both were… unnatural.

The older of the two- a girl of perhaps six- had been dressed and made up as a proper young Lady. Youth was something to be enjoyed and celebrated- yet she looked like she was older than Feyre was now, forced to appear older in spite of her age. A corset was already bending the bones of her ribcage inward, creating the figure men would desire regardless of the cost to the woman. The little one's hair was pinned up in a perfect twist with the odd curl left to frame her face, and Feyre had the sense that it was not for some special occasion, but a daily regimen.

She was breathless as she ran, and despite her sister being no older than three, she couldn't seem to outpace her. Not with the corset restricting her breath so severely.

Which one of them is doing this to me? Feyre and Tealla followed the apparitions into a small tea room where two faceless women were drinking.

The scene shifted. One of the women vanished, and where she'd been sitting there was now a tipped saucer and a still-dripping cup of tea. Feyre heard the echo of the crash as the older one fell, dazed, into the table, upsetting the tea and splashing it on the other woman's guest.

Now that woman was towering over the older sibling, screaming with words Feyre could hardly decipher. She wrenched her child's arm up and practically lifted the girl by it, then began to strike her.

Feyre and Tealla both covered their eyes as the screams of both girls filled their ears- screams not just from that day, but from a hundred days just like it… except this day something went terribly, terribly wrong. A blow meant to bruise broke something weakened by the corset, and the child did not survive.

The sounds faded. When they looked up again, the room was empty.

Dust covered everything, and Feyre felt a great sadness welling in her heart. Something was worse than wrong- an evil was born in that room on that day. The same evil that haunted her. Grief was as powerful an emotion as anger, and the absence of that child-who-was-not-a-child was going to fester and burn.

When Feyre turned around, the flash of something bright caught her eye.

A porcelain doll with a beautiful blue dress and perfectly coiled brown hair.

A twin to the child who'd been beaten, the only thing she'd seen in the Slaugh's memory rendered in perfect, brilliant color. An eternal reminder of what was so brutally lost.

Feyre picked it up gingerly and- driven by an instinct she didn't understand- pushed the closed lids of the doll's eyes up.

The gray-blue eyes that stared back at her from inside its head were decidedly human.

Tealla stumbled back as red blood began to drip from the toy. It was hot and such a horribly familiar feeling that Feyre dropped the doll in horror. The blood pouring out of the doll was worse than the blood of the two fae she'd killed in her final trial against Amarantha. It was the blood of a child, broken and beaten by cruelty.

Feyre, she thought she heard someone call her name, but she was deafened by the roaring of a crowd.

Feyre! No, it was the sound of the Middengard Wyrm.

"FEYRE," Tealla slapped her, the flaring pain of death against life jolting her back to reality. "It's gone. We can't stay here, ok? We have to keep going."

Feyre looked down at her hands- the blood was gone, and the doll's eyes were simple glass ones that looked up at her with an unnerving focus. "Yeah."

She let the teenager shove her from the room and close the door behind them. She said nothing to Tealla as her own legs began moving on their own once more. What other horrors did the house have to show her?

That was only one memory, and Feyre could sense so many more waiting for her in the demon's mind.

Who did that child grow up to be?

Her stomach twisted and a chill crept up her spine.

She had a feeling she already knew the answer.

* * *

"Oh good, you do know how to bathe." Feyre ignored the withering glares of her family as they returned.

Cassian was in a forest-green tunic. His sword was at his side rather than down his spine, and even though he made a filthy gesture at her- or rather the creature inside of her- Feyre didn't seem to notice or care.

Elain had washed dirt off her arms and face from where Nesta's muddy hands had touched her, but the only thing Feyre said to her was, "Try to let this one last the night."

Rhys was back from his meeting with Azriel, and it took everything in his being to walk to his wife's side and plant a kiss on her forehead. It was a familiar disgust that churned inside of him, disgust and humiliation. Amarantha hadn't just taken Feyre's body, she was forcing Rhys to play the same damn games. The only difference this time was that the friends he loved were there to see it.

When this was all over, he might fall apart entirely.

A small satisfaction came in the form of Nesta- strolling in wearing a gown to match Cassian's, but her now-clean hair was right back in its Illyrian brades, bound with strips of leather and metal bands. What's more, her dress revealed her bare arms in a way the leathers never would, and Feyre took in the sight of new scars and training bruises with disgust.

"Do we need to review the use of silverware, or is everyone ready for dinner?" Feyre asked innocently.

Cassian was the first to snap, "Feyre, knock it off or Nesta and I leave tonight. We're not going to put up with this bullshit."

Feyre looked to Rhys, clearly waiting for him to step in.

"Cassian, I'm sorry for earlier. It was my fault," Rhys forced the words through a clenched jaw. "Everyone- let's just try to move past it, alright?"

Elain didn't say anything. She pushed past Feyre, shoving her out of the way with a shoulder. Nesta growled as she passed her youngest sibling and followed Elain out of the foyer and into the formal dining room.

Mor and Lucien had already set the food out on the table.

"We ran out of clean glasses," Mor was drinking from the seat at the head of the table. One leg was draped over an arm of her mahogany chair, and she held a glass pint filled not with beer, but dark wine.

"You're in my seat, Mor," Feyre smiled and tried to keep her voice pleasant, but in a moment she reached for the tone and command of a High Lady to her subject, "Move." Mor was forced to her feet by deep-rooted fae instincts. She carried her mug with her and shot Feyre a dirty look as she walked behind everyone to the chair directly opposite, "That one's for Rhysand. You know we have an important announcement to make. This isn't about you, Morrigan."

Mor stiffened, but she continued past the chair Rhys obediently took.

"Here," Feyre shooed Lucien away from the seat at her left hand with a glare, "why don't you sit beside me. No hard feelings."

Mor walked past Feyre and seriously considered just leaving the dining room altogether, but Feyre caught her sleeve and tugged her back towards the chair. Obediently, Mor sat down.

Mission complete.

"We should make our announcement before anyone eats. That way no one is giving congratulations with a full mouth." She eyed Cassian as though he was particularly likely to offend her in that manner. "After careful thought and consideration, I've decided it is time for Elain to take a more prominent role in this Court."

The decision was made over a week before- one of the last decisions the real Feyre had made. In recognition of Elain's efforts to help welcome and resettle refugees moving to Velaris from both Prythian and the human realm, she was to be named an official Emissary of Night- specifically the one in charge of planning and implementing new expansions to ten of Night's cities, including Velaris.

There were too many refugees or curious settlers for just one city to host, and while Night had plenty of space to create an entirely new city for them, it deprived everyone the chance to learn about other people's cultures and traditions. Special services would be provided to the refugees, be it assistance in establishing their houses, counseling to help them recover from the horrors of the War, or even just a guide to show them the cities and all they had to offer. Elain would be in charge of that- the beacon to guide each team towards their common goal of a peaceful, united land.

Rhys should have known the Slaugh had other ideas.

"Elain, a grave injustice was done to you, and I'm going to set things right." Feyre smiled pleasantly, "I've reached out to Lord Blackwing and he has graciously accepted your hand in marriage. You will be the second most powerful noblewoman in the Court of Nightmares, behind Morrigan's mother."

Blackwing.

Mor's uncle.

One of the males who dragged her into her father's torture chamber and chained her to the carving table.

The one who hammered that note into her stomach.

She looked like she was going to murder Feyre then and there.

"I didn't agree to that," Rhys snapped immediately. Night erupted behind him, and Nesta put a hand on the sword strapped to Cassian's hip.

"My sisters, and as the highest ranking Archeron left, my property." Feyre reached over to pat Elain's hand, but the girl recoiled, "You should have been producing heirs for your Lord Grayson by now, but that fool of a human will never appreciate what he threw away. Lord Blackwing was thrilled to accept the offer."

"I don't accept," Elain's voice was thin, afraid.

"Neither do I." Rhys grabbed one of the candles from the dinner table and flipped it over.

Oil carefully spread beneath the glamoured dinner plates roared to life. Feyre made to stand as the table erupted-

-but while her chair went tumbling back into the wall, even her skirts couldn't cross the thin line of salt and rowan-tree ash that Mor had left in her wake when she circled the table. Ashes hidden in the false-bottom of the pint.

Feyre stared at Rhys over the flames. Her lips curled into a feral, wicked grin, something equal parts wrath and amusement, "What do you think you're doing?"

"Getting my wife back whore." Rhys thrust his fist into the flames. As the fire burned his skin and devoured the paper clutched in his hand- a paper with Amarantha's name written with his own blood- he returned her snarl.

Nesta yanked Elain behind her and drew Cassian's sword. The Illyrian's syphons flashed a blinding red as he readied his power- just in case. Lucien put a hand on Rhys' arm and fed his own magic into the High Lord's body- magic that would keep the fire from burning him too severely.

Mor just watched and waited, safe a step outside of the salt and ash circle.

The paper was devoured, and Rhys pulled his arm free at last.

Feyre's grin widened.

"Looks like someone made a mistake." The creature inside her chuckled. Rhys felt like he was going to be sick- that was not Amarantha's laugh.

Everyone stepped back a little bit further, fear and uncertainty on their faces. The spell should have worked- they'd done everything the wraith told Rhys and Azriel to do.

"You're still stuck here," Lucien snapped when no one else spoke.

Nesta was staring at Feyre with all her might- begging her strange power to tell her something. Cassian put himself between Elain and danger. Lucien extinguished the flames on the table, but kept his own fire at the ready.

Mor shook with pure wrath.

Feyre's eyes drifted to Lucien, "Rowan ash and salt can't hold me for more than a day. You have- what? Five hours left to expel me from this body?"

The Slaugh pulled Mor's abandoned chair over to the head of the table and took her place once more. She folded her hands neatly in front of her and smiled innocently up at Rhysand, "I know about the bargain, I can feel it wrapped around her soul. She was so scared about what would happen once she was finally taken. Would you die?"

Feyre shrugged, calm and collected, "I can hardly even sense her anymore. She won't make it another hour, let alone all the way to midnight. Don't worry though, from my understanding she'll be sent to a very different place than you. At least your afterlife is worth looking forward to. The rest of you- well, I don't intend to leave anything to suggest you existed at all."

Rhys glared at her with a wrath capable of slaughtering continents.

The creature inside of Feyre smiled back, basking in how utterly powerless he was.

Five hours to figure out what ghost Feyre accidentally summoned.

Five hours for her to find her way through the creature's memories, retake control, and force it out once and for all.

Five hours to figure out who Teallaire truly was.


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3**

The woman convinced the world- convinced herself- that it was an accident.

Her eldest daughter died because of the corset. A corset that every _proper_ mother used to help mold her child into a Lady. It weakened her bones until they were too brittle, until a simple trip on the expensive rug in their tea parlor broke the rib that punctured her lung.

Not a single mention of the beating she'd delivered.

An accident- a horrible, agonizing accident. One she couldn't possibly be responsible for.

She found a physician to join her cause- to preach in every corner of the city the dangers of putting those corsets on children. She cried pretty tears to rich friends, claiming the doctor who'd delivered the girls _encouraged_ her to put the eldest in a corset despite her youth.

The man was arrested, tried, and hanged for his role in the child's death.

Her second daughter, meanwhile, was given a doll.

It was a pretty thing, and reminded her of the sister she was told was sleeping forever. Not quite three, she hardly knew what that meant. Still, she played with the doll, brought it everywhere as her constant companion.

Loss still ate away at the girl. She was lonely now, even with the children her parents paid to occupy her time. She grew quieter.

 _It's for the best_ , she heard her parents speaking to an assembly of their friends one evening. Spied on them through the door, _We ask that you respect our wishes… It's the only way she can move on from her grief._

That day her big sister died again.

No one spoke of her sibling- every memory was simply the imagination of a child. She had no sister, save for the one growing now in her mother's belly. Two years old- barely three. If the adults did their duty properly, one day she would simply forget the pain of loss.

If only her parents could do that too.

Her father came home to work, to help run the household while her mother gave birth. He loved his wife desperately, and never once questioned the story of his daughter's death.

He never saw what happened behind closed doors.

—

* * *

—

Teallaire grimaced as they watched yet another memory play out- the mother was strapping a vicious contraption to the chair of a new tea room- the other closed off ever since that horrible day.

A nursemaid held her newer child- two herself now. It was time the five-year-old learn basic etiquette. Even a damned corset would have been kinder than the tool she now used, but corsets were evil. They killed little girls, with no help whatsoever from dear, loving mothers.

Years had not been kind to her second- no, _first_ \- daughter. Her eyes were always watching, always judging. She kept her strange doll close by, but for some reason her heart burned at the sight of it. Her imaginary friend, somehow less lifelike than she'd once been.

Mother said that was because she was growing up.

She sat down in the chair when prompted, expertly hiding the wince of pain as she sat on a bruised bottom- her punishment for wetting the bed. There were other bruises to, from where she was beaten ' _like the animal you insist on being_ '.

Her mother scooted her back until a wooden spike dug into the small of her back. Only when the child whimpered did she stop and wrap two thick leather straps around her shoulders. As her posture straightened, pressure was taken off of the spike and the pain eased somewhat.

" _We shall use this tool every day, until you remember how to sit properly._ " She pushed something through the back of the chair and into a hole in the contraption. Another sharp spike, this one to rest between her shoulder blades.

If she hunched her shoulders, the spike would drive into her back.

If she didn't keep her hips perfectly angled, the second would pierce her spine.

"Barbaric," Tealla whispered. They didn't dare draw attention to themselves in the memory. In a previous one, Feyre sneezed and the executioner stumbled on his way to take the doctor's life in payment for that murdered child.

No one could see them, but they could hear. If the memories were listening then so too might the Slaugh.

Feyre imagined she could feel the dig of the spike as the child grew tired. She had the sense of hours passing. Weeks. Months.

The girl grew in that seat- at least somewhat. Soon her little sister was the one running around- with the elder watching her wearily. She might not remember why, but she knew such frivolity only led to dark places.

"I can't watch this anymore," Feyre pinched the sleeve of Tealla's burial shift and pulled her away from the door and back into the hallway- the only place they seemed to be free to speak.

"Which one do you think is the Slaugh?" Tealla asked, "The girl, or the mother?"

It was impossible to answer.

They'd seen memories of the girl delivering vicious kicks or pinches to servants when her parents weren't looking. She was so young- so helpless- but also angry and lost.

"Cruelty breeds cruelty," Tealla had muttered.

"Were you the girl?" Feyre asked miserably. She was sick of this strange place- of the way the walls and floors warped, the way the faces never stayed the same long enough to focus her eyes. Random things were clear- details that stood out perfectly in memory, long after the rest fell away. It made her feel like she was drunk, dizzy, and upside down.

Tealla shook her head, "My mother could be intense, and I certainly remember what that posture brace felt like, but that was more my father than anything. You know their kind- males who think women are for breeding and selling." She raised an eyebrow at Feyre's horrified look, "Dad was a dick in life. In death he's actually pretty cool. Mom might let him sleep in the house one of these centuries."

"You have a house?" Feyre blurted out.

"No, the afterlife is full of people walking around in the grass. Of course I have a house!"

"Just asking, sheesh."

"What about you?" Tealla prompted, "Before the palaces and mansions and estates, that is. What was home before Night?"

"Spring for about… I don't know, nine months or so? I was a- a guest of that High Lord."

Tealla made a face, "Eew gross, you fucked him didn't you?"

Feyre turned red- or would have if there was color in this world beyond bleeding dolls, "You're a _teenager_ , you shouldn't be talking like that- or about that- to anyone!"

"I've been dead longer than you've been alive." Tealla crossed her arms, "I'll fucking say fuck to any-fucking-one I Cauldron-damn want."

The High Lady of Night closed her eyes and prayed for patience, "Cassian would love you."

"Of-fucking-course he would."

"Please tell me _that's_ who you are? Some relative- past or future- of his?"

"Oh _Cauldron_ not these questions again." Tealla said her own prayer for patience, "I am Teallaire. I am here to help you because I was bored. Not everything has to have a deeper meaning, you know."

Feyre opened her mouth to snap back when Tealla flicked Feyre's sleeve- not enough to touch her and ignite that horrible pain as life met death, but to remind her she could do it if she tried. "Before you were doing the nasty with the High Dick of Spring, what was your house like?"

"It was a hovel," Feyre grumbled. "We didn't have any food, we nearly died every winter, and I took care of everyone by myself. Happy?"

"Who's 'everyone'?"

"My father and two older sisters."

"Why didn't they take care of you?"

Feyre felt a sour tang on the back of her throat, "It wasn't their job, and they certainly weren't willing to help. I did all the hunting, cleaned the kills, prepared the meat- even cut the firewood more often than not and my sisters treated me like shit."

Once she started, she couldn't make herself stop. She thought she'd forgiven them, but being trapped in these horrible memories- it cracked the door to that vault. "I hadn't even started my monthly bleed yet when I went into those woods. Every pelt I sold, every bit of coin I earned- it went to my sisters. My clothes were rags while theirs were at least warm. My stomach would growl when they ate their fill. My arms ached and they- they took everything. Every last thing."

Tealla hesitated, then tore a strip of cloth from the bottom of her dress and held it out to Feyre to wipe her eyes with. No skin-to-skin contact, no pain save that on Feyre's face.

"Why didn't you leave them? Run away?"

"You don't leave family," Feyre said, her voice low. "You endure them… You find some way to love them, no matter how much you hate them."

 _You harden your heart, and accept that if you drown, no one is coming to save you._

—

* * *

—

Azriel arrived from the House of Wind with a simple black satchel in his hand.

Elain took one look at it and ripped the thing away.

"Give it back," Azriel warned, his face grim.

She threw it to Lucien, and when she turned back to the Illyrian Spymaster, hate twisted her face, "You aren't going near her."

"We need a name," Azriel turned his attention to Lucien. "Elain thinks with her heart, which is an admirable quality, but right now logic has to win. Feyre loses to the Slaugh, Rhys dies. I get that name out of the Slaugh, and maybe one day Feyre will forgive me for what she's going to wake up to."

Torture.

Azriel wanted to- no, not 'wanted to'. Feyre was one of his closest, deepest friends. He'd taught her to fly and to fight. He saw her grow from that broken female into the sort of High Lady who protected her people over all else. She was the evening star that guided them all as they fought to forge a better world.

To keep that star in their sky, he would turn it red.

It would kill him, he knew it would, but his sanity was a worthy trade for her and Rhysand's lives. For the future of Night.

"We aren't that desperate yet." Lucien vanished in a blast of black smoke. Wherever he was hiding Azriel's tools, the Spymaster didn't have time to find them again before Feyre's time was truly up.

He pulled out Truthteller.

"If you touch her, I will break every single bone in your body," Nesta stood in the doorway to the dining room, blocking Rhysand from seeing what his friend had in mind.

"I want to save her," silver lined Azriel's eyes.

"I appreciate that," Nesta's voice held no menace, but the promise of violence dripped from every word. "For once- and hopefully only this once- I agree with Lucien. We aren't that desperate. Not yet."

Azriel flicked his wrist and Truthteller was replaced with a black book. He threw it at Nesta, "Figure it out, then."

Inside was a list of names, locations, and descriptions. Everyone he knew who spoke against Feyre enough that they were deemed a threat. Tamlin, Beron, mortal queens- even Nesta's name was on his list.

"The ones crossed out in red are no longer living. Blue means I don't think they're a genuine threat." Tarquin, Cresseida, Varian- their names were all in blue. Tamlin's had a blue dot beside it- as if Azriel couldn't make himself cross it out.

Nesta threw the book back without turning any more pages, "This is useless to me. I don't give a shit who hated Ferye, I need to know who _she_ hated."

Rhys at last appeared over her shoulder, drawn away from the now-silent Slaugh, weary and on edge, "I would know if there was anyone besides Amarantha she was afraid of. I've tried a dozen names already- anyone who was Under the Mountain, even friends of her in Spring who might have died in the War. It won't talk. It won't give us any clues. It's running out the clock."

He flinched as it struck ten. Two hours left.

They imprisoned the Slaugh at eight. It was a simple enough game.

"Cassian went to her studio with Mor to try and find something," Rhys told Azriel. "Maybe she painted something." His tone was utterly defeated. The mating bond was hardly there, and he felt a tug on his mind, beckoning him into the darkness.

He tried raging, screaming, throwing anything he could reach and destroying furniture. The Slaugh now stood on a pile of ash- the remains of the table and chairs. Rhys' only comfort was that the salt shaker exploded, combining with debris to limit the Slaugh's movement further.

"Hybern!" Elain pleaded, "Brannagh, Dagdan-"

"I tried all of those." Rhys looked down at his hand. It was caked with dried blood, and shook with weariness that he'd never known before. Blood to write the names. Power to feed the papers into a fire. Infinitely more strength to endure the glimmer of satisfaction in the Slaugh's eyes each time he named the wrong person.

He even tried his own father's name, in case the male was haunting him from beyond the grave. Cursebreaker or not- he would never have approved of a once-mortal bride.

Nesta looked back at the book in Azriel's hand, "Elain?"

"Yeah?"

"Did Feyre ever write it?" Her story. She'd mentioned once she wanted to put her story to paper, something she could hold and re-read on the harder days. Nesta knew the real reason she'd written it though- to remind herself in case her immortal mind forgot where she came from, and all she'd endured.

"Yes but- Nesta, she was incredibly thorough. It's thousands of pages long. We don't have time."

"We don't have any better options, either." Nesta stepped forward, "Take me to it."

"She made me _swear_ not to read it without her permission." Elain's mark of that oath was hidden in the small of her back where even she couldn't see it, a kindness for the Archeron who didn't wish for such tattoos on her skin.

"She made all of us swear," Rhys confirmed, "but you weren't here… and she didn't make us promise not to show you." He sighed, "I hope Feyre's around to kill me for this later but- second floor, turn right, and when you reach the end of the hall… keep walking."

Feyre's glamour was so thickly woven he had no idea how to break it.

"The one on the right," Elain added, as if that were helpful. She wouldn't leave her spot between Azriel and the door. Even bare handed, he was a master torturer.

Nesta hurried past Azriel and Elain to the staircase, then followed Rhys' directions to the letter.

At the top of the steps, she turned right until the angles of the house forced her to turn left. That hallway was one she vaguely remembered from her half-drunk tour a lifetime ago. Five guest rooms, all neatly laid out with their friends in mind and not a single picture of Nesta to be found upon the walls.

 _I earned this_ , she thought as she marched bast the portraits. _I deserved to be erased. Every day of her life, I earned it._

Nesta reached the end of the hall. The room she and Cassian had bathed in was the second door on the left. She hadn't even paid the wall any attention as they followed Elain inside. Before that, the last time she'd seen this part of the house was on her tour, while she was half-drunk, surly, and lost in her own personal Hell.

Now, with a clear mind and a keen eye, she saw a flicker from one corner. Always the corner- small bursts of light that no one else could ever notice.

A glamour.

Nesta squared her shoulders and marched forward, not even wincing as she collided with marble-

-and walked straight through it.

A sixth room, one Nesta wasn't supposed to see, stood against the left wall.

She knew what it was. Knew why Feyre hid it- to prevent that miserable drunkard of a sibling from saying something else nasty and hurtful. To preserve her own heart, she'd hidden Nesta's room.

It was Feyre's way of wincing before a blow.

There was another door on the right, probably the one that Elain told her to go through. Nesta wanted nothing more than to open the left-hand door to that hidden room- _her_ room- and see what was inside.

But that room only meant something if the female who created it was there to show her in.

Nesta turned right, towards a door of stained glass lilies- her favorite flower. It was a kindness to put that image on the door across from her own, that she might see it every time she left the room.

The door opened on a library. Another kindness Nesta had not yet earned.

A large section of the first floor was devoted to books and reading, but this upstairs library held row after row of adventure, romance, and intrigue. They were books Nesta would have loved, books Elain utterly devoured.

Blankets were casually tossed over soft blue couches. Pillows were squished into corners or the backs of seats, extra padding for whoever preferred to be there. Apart from it all, in a corner that overlooked the garden, was a desk piled high with paper and ink.

Feyre's story.

Faelights woke as she approached the desk and read the last words Feyre had written- something about what she and Rhys had done after a battle with Hybern that made Nesta's cheeks redden. But that time wouldn't yield any answers, and Feyre was still telling the tale from the very beginning, there would be no insights into what she was thinking about _now_ , two years later.

Still, something nagged at her, kept her rooted to the desk.

Nesta cursed at her own stupidity and flipped the hefty stack of papers over- as Elain promised, two thousand hand-written papers in neat stacks, divided by some chaptering system her sister had decided on.

She found page one-

 _The forest had become a labyrinth of snow and ice._

Nesta read, fascinated by the story of the wolf, the memory of that meal real enough that she could still taste it on her tongue.

She kept reading, even as her heart shattered.

She read her deepest shame and felt the burning ache as every dark thought in her mind was confirmed. How she'd rationalized it back then- the horrible words she spoke to Feyre. Her own dark satisfaction at the anguish, cold, and bitterness in Feyre's eyes.

Nesta pulled up a corner of her skirts to hold against her cheek- keeping her tears from ruining those pages as she cried.

Her torture ended on the sixteenth page. She couldn't force herself to go any further.

And there was no need for it either. She knew who the Slaugh was. Had known… had known and refused to believe it.

Feyre was blameless in summoning that beast.

It came because of Nesta.

—

* * *

—

"What's your favorite color?"

"Blue."

"Favorite food?"

"Roast chicken with rosemary and garlic."

"If you were stranded on a desert island all alone, what would be the one thing you brought with you?"

"A raft."

Tealla huffed, "OTHER than that."

Feyre had endured the girl's questions for what felt like hours as they walked the endless corridor. The Slaugh's memories of abuse- either as victim or abuser- grew more and more insidious against the five and three year old children. The new-eldest burned with hate and loathing, accepted her mother's rules and orders, and became a miniature of that hated woman.

"Music."

"Wait- really?" Tealla raised an eyebrow.

Feyre hesitated to expand on that answer, but she didn't care anymore if the girl was somehow trying to study her, perhaps replace her too as the Slaugh had done. Her heart ached for the abused girls, and she was tired of seeing their mother succeed when someone- _anyone_ \- should have stopped it.

Where was the children's father?

"I was a prisoner for a time. Before you make any of your smart-ass comments, I didn't do anything wrong. The one who kept me prisoner was worse than any creature I've ever heard of or known. You lived in Velaris?" she glanced back and saw Tealla's nod, "Bryaxis never scared me half as much as she did… Amarantha." The name was poison on her tongue. "My husband was forced to play her pet. I thought he was my enemy, even though he was doing everything he could to get us out alive."

Feyre swallowed hard, "I broke. Shattered as wholly and completely as you can. I was alone in the world, without a single friend to even sit by my side while I cried. Rhys felt my despair and he sent me music. Something impossible in that hell, something that made me see a world beyond my cell- made me see Velaris." Feyre closed her eyes and a sliver of tension eased from her shoulders as she remembered that vision, "It wasn't a desert island, but I was trapped and alone, and the music saved me."

Tealla was quiet for a long moment, "I loved the harp. My family- we had a lot of old junk just laying around and one day I found this crappy wooden instrument as tall as my father hidden beneath a blanket. I holed up in the basement as often as possible. I found a tunnel that led there from behind a statue a few halls down from my bedroom. I hid from the world, and I taught myself how to play."

The teenager shuddered and her story ended. She'd learned to play, but her life ended before she could share her talent with anyone.

Even in the next world she hadn't gone searching for a new harp to play. Her dreams were useless. She didn't want to play in a death-orchestra. She'd wanted to play in one of the theaters along the Sidra.

"I'm sorry," Feyre offered.

"Me too, for what happened to you."

"I know who the Slaugh is," Feyre said quietly. "At least- I think I do."

"Why aren't you fighting it then?" Tealla didn't seem surprised in the least. Maybe that was what the rambling questions were for- her way of soothing the High Lady's mind as she struggled to make sense of what was happening.

It was an evil she never knew she'd escaped… and the spark that ignited a hatred she finally understood.

"The only way to fight it is to apologize."

"To the Slaugh?"

Feyre shook her head, "To my sisters."

Tealla might have replied, if there wasn't a soft growl from behind them.

Feyre turned slowly, heart pounding-

-and came face-to-face with the Gray Lady.

—

* * *

—

Cassian and Mor were back by the time Nesta came downstairs.

Her eyes were red-rimmed and bright with tears. Her steps labored, hollow. Cassian said something to her as she passed, but she didn't hear him. Didn't answer.

 _I don't need to listen to language like that from a half-wild beast._

Nesta hated that creature… she never realized she'd turned into her.

She'd rationalized and told herself that Feyre knew she was the golden child, knew she was infuriatingly superior to her siblings-

-but they'd never told her. Never gave her a kind word or a gesture of thanks. Never made her feel loved and appreciated for keeping them alive.

Rhys was speaking.

Again, she heard nothing.

Nesta grabbed Azriel's knife from its sheath as she passed. She slashed her palm and dropped the knife on the cold stone floor.

She didn't look at Feyre as she entered the dining room. She grabbed one of Rhys' papers and wrote a name out in her own blood. A name she'd sworn never to speak again. A name she now remembered, if only for the sake of the sister she'd failed so completely.

Nesta held the paper into a fire, not caring if the flames singed her skin, and looked up at the Slaugh. It hissed as the paper burned, and she knew she was right.

Nesta released the final bits of paper to burn in the flame and sagged back against the wall. She slid down until her hands came to rest on her knees. Her eyes never left those of the Slaugh. Only hatred was left in Feyre's gaze- all that was left after Hell burned away the rest.

Nesta took a deep breath and just prayed she wasn't too late to save her sister.

Her _fourth_ sister.

"Marion was real, and I remember what you did to her."

—

* * *

—

Tealla tackled the Gray Lady before she could touch Feyre.

The teenager drove her to the hall floor in a tangle of limbs and blows. Feyre took a step forward-

-a shockwave went through the Slaugh, through the world.

It brought back color and light, settled the face of the beast that snarled at Tealla with feral wrath. That pulse of light and clarity showed Feyre the truth she'd been running from ever since the madness started.

The Gray Lady hissed and grabbed Tealla around the throat. Feyre wasn't sure if one ghost could kill another, but she wasn't going to find out. She launched herself at the Gray Lady, braced herself for the pain and the cold.

Her body collided with the mother she'd lost so long ago.

—

* * *

—

" _Stay together, and look after them._ " Nesta shook her head in disgust, "You made Feyre swear that oath, but I'm the one who turned that into an anchor and dragged her down."

Nesta read enough of the book to know that oath had been first and foremost in Feyre's mind back then, in her final human months. Maybe she forgot it after becoming fae. Maybe she figured she'd already done her duty in bringing them all to Night…

But if Nesta knew her sister, she knew those words would haunt her again the moment Feyre banished her from Velaris.

"That oath- it's how you found her."

"So worried she'd disappointed my memory," the Slaugh hissed. "Who would have thought my most disappointing child would become my most brilliant?" It waved a hand to the crown atop Feyre's head, "I thought I could make you into a good enough lady- but look at you. Sleeping in the mud and rutting with some bastard nobody. Meanwhile that stupid little imp is a Queen."

"Prythian doesn't have Queens and Kings."

"Prythian deluded itself into thinking that. Why else do the High Lords have palaces, thrones, and crowns?"

Nesta conceded the point, "Fine, maybe Feyre is a Queen… but that doesn't change anything. You're still a murderer. You're still dead, and it's good to know that the vale holds your kind to account."

"Marion wasn't my fault!" The Slaugh hissed.

"Yes she was. You're the one who hit her until she stopped breathing."

" _It wasn't my fault_!" Her mother's denial would continue then, even in death.

Nesta shrugged, "You spent all that time in Hell, and you still can't admit you fucked up?"

"DON'T YOU DARE USE THAT LANGUAGE IN MY PRESENCE!"

"So what? You're a ghost of etiquette now?" Nesta said. "You're pathetic. I would have hoped the mother of a _Queen_ would at least be an interesting demon."

The Slaugh growled and Nesta stood. She faced down the mother who was far too similar to her for comfort, "You know any good Lady loves small-talk, but seeing as we've established I'm no longer aproper Lady, I think it's fine to cut to the point. What do you want?"

"No," her mother actually laughed, "you're not _talking_ me out of this body. Feyre's father spoiled her, ruined her as a Lady-"

"He saved her from you."

"-she doesn't deserve the throne, and I don't deserve to spend eternity in that place!"

"No," Nesta agreed, "you deserve to _burn_ there."

Nesta finally looked to the door, to where Elain stood beside Rhysand, a hand to her mouth, "What's next?"

Rhys shook his head slowly, "You gave it a name… It's up to Feyre now."

The Slaugh laughed again, "That fool and her little friend won't last another _minute_."

"Friend?" Nesta's attention snapped back, "What friend?"

It was Elain who answered Nesta's question, "The one I asked Nuala and Cerridwen to find."

—

* * *

—

It was impossible for Feyre to hold onto her mother's throat long enough to strangle her.

Mercifully, the reverse was true as well.

Blinding agony shot through both females each time life and death touched, but whatever happened on the outside gave her hope. The Slaugh didn't seem able to keep her hold on Feyre's mind anymore, and in the hallway it was forced to concede ground foot by foot. They'd spent hours wandering the endless hall, but Feyre knew that the door she wanted would be close by- if Tealla could get it open.

The girl had at least _some_ training to fight. She knew how to take a blow and how to block most, but overall her style was sloppy. Tealla herded Feyre and her mother down the hallway, and whenever she wanted to adjust their trajectory she'd simply wait for Feyre to untangle herself from the latest attempt at physical battle and then promptly dive for the Slaugh's knees, knocking her to her back.

Feyre tried ripping a chunk off of her burial shroud and wrapping it around her mother's throat the next time they connected, but the thin fabric wasn't strong enough to withstand the strain of suffocating someone.

She'd sworn to that creature- that child-killer- that she would keep the family together. Feyre always knew her mother was cold and aloof, but a murderess? What did she owe a monster like that? Her mother should have been thrown into the deepest, darkest cell and left to starve to death. She didn't deserve the life she'd lived after that little girl perished- a life of comfort and ease.

For a brief moment Feyre considered sentencing her mother's soul to The Prison. It would serve her right- but even if the guards of that horrible place came they would likely take Feyre's body with them.

Feyre drew her strength and lunged for her mother- but Tealla beat her there. She tackled the woman, and sunk her teeth into the Slaugh's throat.

It hissed and flung her aside- hard enough to crack her skull against the wall. Tealla slumped, dazed. Her eyes flickered and her hands grasped at nothing, but Feyre just yelled "STAY DOWN!"

As soon as the Slaugh faced Feyre, Tealla's eyes focused and she grinned a savage, bloody grin.

She was behind the beast.

Feyre ignored every flash of pain as she renewed her attack on her mother. Her blows grew sloppy as her arms tired, but she didn't give an inch, she only took step after step forward, pushing the Slaugh back every time until-

Tealla grabbed it by the neck- precisely where she'd bitten the damned woman- and twisted her as Feyre slammed her foot into the creature's stomach.

The Slaugh flew backwards into the dusty parlor that could never be opened.

One a young Feyre was forced to swear never to enter.

Her mother charged the door, but a web of magic held her in place. She struck it hard and fell back, stunned, "What is this?!"

"Look down, bitch." Tealla grinned.

The doll was at her feet. Fear crept into the Slaugh's eyes.

"Fun fact about totems- they actually take on _more_ power after you die." Tealla smiled pleasantly. "For example, if you think something might bring you a little luck, it will bring that luck to someone else. If you tell a little girl her dead sister is a doll-"

A whisper of silk against the parlor floor. The Slaugh turned.

A six year old stood there free of the absurd gown, free of the hairstyle that would have taken torturous hours to complete- hours any child should have been outside playing.

She looked up at her mother with bright, calm eyes, her burial gown flowing on an unknown breeze. The child curtseyed, "Good evening mother."

"Marion," the name was barely a breath on the wind.

The little girl looked past her to Feyre and Tealla and dropped into another deep curtsey, "My deepest apologies," she said in a voice that was young and old at the same time, "I must have a word with my mother in private. Thank you for bringing her to me, dear Feyre. And thank you for your assistance, Lady."

The child reached out and gently pushed the door closed. The latch clicked-

-and the agonized screams of the Slaugh filled the hall..

Feyre could feel the void devour her mother. That tug at her back faded and vanished as the world around them began to disappear.

"Congratulations," Tealla reached out to punch Feyre's arm, but stopped just before contact. Obligingly, Feyre jostled as if she'd touched. Neither was eager to feel any more of that pain.

"Do you think she's really gone?" The door disappeared, and with it the final echo of the Slaugh's screams.

"I think that's your answer. Though- might have to have a word with little Marion there about calling me 'Lady'. That's just insulting to my memory."

Feyre looked to the teenager, uncertain, "You- you actually helped me."

"I told you I would. I don't lie."

"Why?" Feyre needed to know. She needed to understand why someone she never met would go out of their way to help her- to perhaps risk even their place in the afterlife to do battle with the Slaugh and help her reclaim her own mind.

"Like I said, boredom is a powerful motivator," Tealla winked, "and I wanted to see what all the fuss was about- Feyre Cursebreaker and all." She stiffened and looked over her shoulder, to a shining white door that opened slowly, "My time's almost up too. It must be near midnight." She hesitated, and uncertainty crept into her eyes, "Feyre? Can I ask a favor?"

"What?"

The teenager shuffled her feet. There was something she wanted to ask but she wasn't sure how to do it, or even if it was her place to make the request, "When we die, we maintain some connections to your world. I'm not in some grand valley with everyone and everything who ever lived- I'm only with those who are buried nearest me. It's possible to visit others without too much trouble but…"

"You want me to move your body? What about your parents?"

Tealla waved her words away, "No, not for me. I still have family of flesh and blood who visit my gravestone. Marion- she might never have had a visitor." The teenager looked to Feyre with bright, pleading eyes, "Would you please at least consider going to the mortal lands and bringing her back? No one cares about fae or human beyond the veil, and I think she'd really love Velaris. Especially since her family is here."

Feyre swallowed hard as a tear slipped down her cheek. A sister only Nesta knew as some doll and a dream, "Moving her wouldn't… I don't know, make her angry?"

Tealla laughed sadly, "She's probably buried near your mother somewhere. I think she'd appreciate being elsewhere. Spirits aren't isolated from your world. I'm sure Marion watched you and Elain grow up- protected you, as best she could. Go to her grave and ask her permission, she'll find a way to tell you what she wants."

"Alright," Feyre couldn't touch Tealla, but she put a hand over her own heart, "I swear."

"Thank you." Tealla turned to the white door- her return to her realm.

"Are you buried in Velaris?" Feyre blurted out. She wasn't entirely ready to let the girl go, she felt a kinship somehow, "I want to visit- and bring my mate so he can thank you for helping me."

The teenager's grin was bright, "After you bury Marion, wander through the Velaris cemetery. My grave will find you. Oh- and do you know a business in the Rainbow called 'The Goblin's Dessert'?" Feyre nodded, she and Elain visited the old cafe often, "Bring a slice of triple-chocolate mousse cake for me. It's better than anything in your world or mine."

"I will," Feyre grinned, "thank you again."

Tealla put her hand on the door and lightly pushed it open, "Thank you, Feyre. You were everything I'd hoped you'd be and more."

—

* * *

—

When Feyre's body fell, Rhys shattered the circle.

He and Nesta pulled her from the room into the entryway- somewhere open and not filled with debris and the stench of burning paper. Azriel and Lucien both took up positions around Elain to protect her should anything happen. Mor and Cassian each unsheathed weapons. Just in case.

Rhys didn't trust the mating bond to tell him if Feyre was alright, he just held her while she took deep, even breaths.

The clock kept moving, crawling towards a midnight that would either kill them both or save the female he loved.

Feyre's eyes opened just before the chime struck. She didn't say anything, wasn't sure she could yet, but she managed to lift her shaking hand to grasp Rhysand's. Her body felt disjointed and strange, every muscle was aching with exhaustion, and yet she squeezed his fingers and offered a weak smile.

"You have no idea how much I've missed you," Rhys whispered as he bent over and kissed Feyre's forehead. He sent a flicker of love and strength down their mating bond, and Feyre's tired soul answered in kind.

Unmistakably her. Unmistakably alive.

Feyre's eyes looked around the room until she saw Nesta. Her fingers twitched, and her sister came closer.

"She figured out what was wrong," Rhys said. It wasn't entirely true, but he didn't know how much Feyre knew about what had happened. The minute she woke up didn't seem like the time to tell her that it was her own mother who tried to take her body and trade her soul away.

Nesta couched by Feyre and, when she didn't move, Feyre's arm slowly found its way to the hand that was resting against the floor. A long, slow blink and a squeeze of the fingers conveyed her message well enough-

 _I know_.

The eldest sister swallowed and looked up at the faces around her. Cassian, Azriel, Elain, Lucien, Mor- each of them wanted to see Feyre. They needed to see her face and communicate in some way to convince themselves she was alright.

"When you're all done, if it's alright, I'd like to speak to Feyre privately." Not Elain. Not yet. Nesta would explain the missing piece of their family to her later.

Mor was the first one to Feyre's side after Nesta stepped back. Rhys adjusted how he was sitting so that Feyre could lean against his back and hold Mor's hand more comfortably. Next was Cassian, who surprisingly refrained from any snarky or sarcastic remarks. Then it was Azriel's shadows, moving ahead of their master to read Feyre and reassure him that there was no long-lasting damage. Lucien came after Azriel. Even if she didn't believe it in those early days, he was one of her first friends in Prythian. He kissed the back of her hand as she offered a wan smile and a nod of her head.

To her credit, Elain waited until the others spoke to Feyre before practically throwing herself on her sister (and Rhys in the process). She was the one who noticed something was wrong, and for most of the past week had been hunting through the library on her own mission to find the cause. Seeing her whole and well made Elain's heart ache.

"You need to build up your strength again, I'm going to make you some broth," she vowed.

"Mor and I set aside the food you made for dinner when we glamoured the table," Lucien looked to Azriel, "want to help reheat it?"

Azriel nodded, and the males departed. Mor pulled Cassian towards the dining room to begin cleaning up the mess there, and Elain tore herself away from Feyre to see to her promise in the kitchen. It was all an excuse to busy themselves and give Nesta her time.

"There's a chaise in the sitting room," Rhys told Nesta. He kissed Feyre's head once more and scooped her up into his arms. Rhysand led the way with his mate secure. She nuzzled into his chest to listen to his heartbeat as he walked.

Her mind felt more alert as her soul settled back into its body. Strength would return in time, but Feyre wondered how long it would be before she could sleep again. That nightmare haunted her- how many other Slaughs would she accidentally summon? Could Amarantha truly come back? Could Hybern?

She sent the question down the bond to Rhysand.

"I'll find out," he murmured as he set Feyre down on the long chair. It would keep her propped up in his absence, enough that she could eat and look at Nesta comfortably when they spoke. Feyre tried again and sent one more impulse down the bond. She didn't have all the words to express what she felt, but he smiled all the same, "Of course."

Nesta waited in the doorway while Rhysand removed pins and ties from Feyre's hair, untangled the sapphire crown from it, and then gently removed her necklace and heavy earrings. He even ran his fingers against her scalp, scratching out the itches and aches from her mother's brutal style preferences.

"Alright, she's all yours," Rhys smiled at Nesta. He kissed Feyre once more, gathered up all of her jewelry and hair supplies, and walked to the door. "I'm going to be summoning Nuala and Cerridwen's mother to ask her to release the hostages-" Feyre tried to turn her head, "- _and_ ask about warding against anymore Slaughs, yes. If you hear any voices in the hallway don't try to look. I'll let you know when it's safe."

"Thank you, Rhys." Nesta said on both her and Feyre's behalf.

She walked over to her little sister, and the moment Nesta took a seat on the edge of the chaise, Feyre's hand found hers once more.

Nesta didn't meet her eyes. She didn't want to see whatever message her sister wanted to convey. There was something else she had to say first. Something Feyre needed to hear.

" _The forest had become a labyrinth of snow and ice_." Feyre took a long, shuddering breath. Nesta held her hand tight, "I'm mad at myself. Not you. I was cruel and vindictive and- and I don't dispute a single word you wrote. If anything, you were kind in your depiction. I said horrible things to you, I treated you like dirt, and you never stopped trying to take care of us."

Nesta slid off the chaise to her knees, still holding Feyre's hand, "As the oldest living Archeron, I hereby relieve you of your oath. Don't worry ever again about keeping our family together. That's my job, from today until my last. I swear to you that as long as I live I will do _everything_ in my power to make sure you know how grateful I am for everything you've done for us. You didn't fail me, I failed you."

Feyre tried to protest, but Nesta shook her head.

"I know you don't blame me for the last couple of years. Fine. Blame me for the years before that, for twenty years of bullying and failure. Feyre, you were our hero before you ever set foot in Prythian. I'm sorry I ever made you feel otherwise. I was _barely_ better than our mother, and there's no excuse for it."

That's what she'd been practicing with Cassian over and over again- an excuse. She'd planned to explain to Feyre that the reason she fell so far was out of shock and horror at what she did to Hybern. She was raised to be a _Lady_ , she shouldn't have felt the way she did holding that severed head. She should have been disgusted, not proud. It broke her in ways she still didn't entirely understand-

-but now that felt a bit too much like giving _herself_ peace. She would find a way to explain it all to Feyre one day, but for now she wanted to earn forgiveness for twenty years of sins, then they could tackle the two years since Hybern's downfall.

"I'll protect this family," Nesta said again. "You just worry about being happy. You deserve it a thousand times over for everything you did for us… and don't be kind anymore- write every ugly truth. When people read your story in a thousand years I want them to know how strong you were. We earned our roles, and it's up to us to prove we can be better."

Silver lined Feyre's eyes as she nodded. Nesta slid back onto the chair and stared deep into her sister's eyes, "Whatever you saw when she possessed you, if you ever need to talk about it, I will always be there to listen. I don't care if I have to run all the way back here from the Steppes in the middle of winter."

Nesta felt Feyre's mind brush against hers and she lowered her shield. Feyre just sent one short vision- brief and yet crystal clear: A child barely old enough to walk laughing and running after her big sister through a long hallway.

The vision ended before they entered the parlor where Marion was to die. It was the most precious gift Feyre could have given Nesta- not the memory of a doll, but the memory of her sister.

Feyre swallowed hard and tried using the words that were flickering back into her mind, "I want… her here… in Velaris."

Nesta squeezed Feyre's hand once more, her face wet with tears, "I think that's a wonderful idea."

—

* * *

—

Azriel sent agents into the remains of the human city Feyre had grown up in.

Most of it was destroyed by Hybern during the War, but even Hybern didn't care about the cemeteries. They found the keepers of the burial records, and those keepers pointed them to a stone mausoleum bearing the Archeron name. Feyre's father built it when their fortunes were high, or so she thought. Her mother was supposed to be the only body inside.

Feyre, Nesta, and Elain waited outside in the chilly November air while Azriel and Rhys searched the mausoleum for Marion's unmarked grave. They weren't allowed in when their mother's coffin was sealed beneath a stone lid in a tomb befitting a queen… so that was where Rhys and Azriel would check first.

Sure enough, beside the withered corpse of a withered soul, Rhys and Azriel found a second coffin.

They didn't touch it. Didn't disturb that child's rest. All Rhys did was go to the door and nod to his wife. Nesta was the one who went inside.

"We want to take you to a new resting place," she set her hand on the coffin as she spoke. Azriel blanketed her mother's remains in deep shadow, hiding the damned woman. "Would you like to go home with your sisters?"

An unseasonably warm breeze drifted through the graveyard, caressed Elain and Feyre's cheeks, and brought to the crypt the scent of lilacs.

It was all the answer they needed.

Mor, Cassian, and Lucien waited in the Velaris graveyard for their return, dressed in mourning black as the Archerons and the males appeared. Azriel and Rhys each held the coffin, and as Mor went to Feyre's side, she looped an arm around her friend's shoulders.

No one gave a eulogy or performed a service, but they each took a moment alone with the coffin. Marion would be reburied on a hill that overlooked Velaris- complete with a view of the estate far across the city. It was the closest graveyard to their home.

Nesta was the last to the coffin, and the only one not to whisper some prayer to the child within. She just stood there, staring at her own big sister. A sister her heart never stopped loving or missing, even as the girl herself faded into distant memory.

"Come on," Cassian murmured to the others, "she doesn't do well with an audience."

Mor retrieved a small bag from behind the tombstone and handed it to Feyre, then followed Cassian off on some winding path through the graves. Elain, Lucien, and Azriel likewise found a way to make themselves scarce. Elain wasn't sure how to feel about the lost sister, or the truth about their mother. Until she sorted it all out the steady friendship of the males by her side would offer strength.

Feyre leaned on Rhysand's shoulder as they walked. Four days after the Slaugh's defeat, and she was finally starting to feel like herself.

The graveyard held an odd mix of peace and sadness. So many tombstones, so many souls who loved and lost- and now perhaps even looked back at their world from beyond.

 _Will that be us someday?_ Feyre wondered. _Will Rhys and I be on the other side of the veil watching our children's lives? Their children's? Will I get to see Marion then?_

"Feyre?" Rhys pinched the back of her sweater to stop his wife as they neared twin monuments engraved with the Night Court emblem, "I'd like you to meet my mother and my sister."

Feyre smiled at the graves of those females she could never meet… ones Rhysand had told her countless stories of already. She knew he, Cassian, and Azriel came to clean the tombstones on the anniversary of their passing. It was a rite even Mor didn't participate in. They were the ones who called Rhysand's mother their own. After they finished, Mor would step forward to place flowers over their graves.

"I wish I could have known them." She'd come to the graves once on her own, to pay her respects in silence. Even Rhys didn't know.

"Me too," Rhys smiled sadly before stepping up to the foot of his mother's grave. "Is breá liom duit, a mháthair." _I love you, mother._

It was an ancient High Fae tongue, one Rhys' father made him learn as a form of punishment. Feyre was learning it on her own, though she'd mostly abandoned her studies in favor of learning the Illyrian tongue for now.

As Feyre bowed to Rhys' mother, he moved on to rest a hand on his sister's grave. His words for her were softer, especially today when they buried another child taken far too early, " _Airím uaim thú, Teallaire._ " I miss you, brat.

Feyre's chest grew unbearably tight as she stepped up to that grave.

 _Rhys' sister?_

 _Yes._

 _Really?!_

 _Sure._

 _Are you just saying that so I'll stop trying to guess?_

 _Of course._

Not a lie at all, just a truth hidden in sarcasm.

The questions Tealla pestered her with, the ridiculous scenarios she came up with to see how Feyre thought and what she treasured most- not a ghost trying to glean information at all. A sister trying to get to know her brother's mate.

 _You were everything I'd hoped you'd be and more._

Feyre smiled as she stepped forward and set the parcel Mor brought her at the base of the tombstone. Rhys didn't ask, he just pulled his wife in close and held her against the November chill.

When she looked back at the grave, the cake was gone.

—

* * *

—

The house reeked of sage.

Nuala and Cerridwen went overboard cleansing each room of any dark energies that might lurk after the Slaugh's defeat. No more demons from the past. No more nightmares.

Nesta was laying awake, curled on her side as she looked across the room to a painting she caught Feyre throwing out hours before. The painting of Feyre and Elain with their father.

After she'd gone back into the house, Nesta slipped out to rescue the portrait. In its place downstairs was one of all Archeron sisters, with a smiling little Marion in the center. This painting- Nesta knew why Feyre wanted it gone. Why she wouldn't even dare paint over the smiling trio, as if the canvas itself were tainted.

It brought Nesta no joy to know that her little sister finally hated their father.

He'd loved his wife so blindly that he didn't challenge what she was doing to their children. Nesta knew he suspected something more was behind Marion's death- that was why he moved his business into the house and refused to go away on any more long trips. But… he never asked what happened. The only time he stood up to her was when he took young Feyre into his study and taught her trade- not manners.

One day Feyre would figure out how she felt, and only then would Nesta give the painting back to her to destroy or preserve as she saw fit.

A whisper of a breeze came through the open window and Nesta felt something settle behind her on the bed.

She heard a baby crying off in the distance, punctuated with the wild crash of thunder and the roar of falling rain. The infant was terrified as a storm raged so far away, and so long ago.

' _Ssh_ ,' a soft voice murmured against her ear as strong arms lifted her, ' _I'm here. Your big sister is here._ ' She remembered being carried through a world that was too big and wild for her to understand, until she was set down in a nest of warm blankets on the floor. ' _Don't cry Nessie, it's alright. Just the rain. I won't let anything hurt you, I promise._ '

It was an impossible memory from her childhood- one she should have been too young to retain. She remembered Marion struggling to lift her from her crib- the strength of the then-four-year-old flagging. She remembered being held warm and safe and loved. Back then Nesta believed nothing was strong enough to defeat Marion. She was the best big sister in the whole wide world, especially in the eyes of the infant who loved her.

' _It's okay Nessie,_ ' the voice repeated and Nesta could have sworn she felt arms wrap around her. ' _I'm right here with you, and I always will be._ '

When Nesta woke the next morning, there was an imprint of a child's head on the pillow behind her and the scent of lilacs hanging in the air.

Marion was finally at peace, and so was Nesta.


End file.
